Monday, March 23, 2009

The Kitty Mafia Part 1

I grew up around cats. We always had at least one. Rarely did we have more than one. After I graduated college and got my first apartment, I brought my cat Holly to live with me. I soon discovered that due to work, I spent more time away from my apartment than in it, so I brought in another cat, Cleopatra, to keep Holly company. It was then that I discovered that my apartment was actually run by the Kitty Mafia.

I didn't make the discovery right away. At first everything seemed fairly normal. Both Holly and Cleo would sleep on the bed with me at night. This was normal - every cat I have had has done this. They would also wake me up in the morning for food. Again, this was normal. (See these youtube videos for reference.) We had a routine - they would make noise to wake me, and I would grumble, tell them to go away, and roll over. They would make more noise, and I would throw something in their general direction. The noise would continue, and I would get up and put them out of the bedroom and shut the door. This of course would result in scratching at the door.

After awhile it finally dawned on me that it wasn't Holly that was waking me up in the morning - it was Cleo. I was only seeing part of the story. (I use the excuse that they were waking me up, so I wasn't really with it.) This is what was really happening:

Cleo, Holly and I were sleeping peacefully. The sun began to creep above the horizon. Sensing the change in sunlight, Holly gets up and stretches. She bats Cleo, who wakes up, and then jumps down from the bed and ambles out of the room, but stays near the doorway. Cleo then stretches, and begins to knead as close to my head as possible, pawing my face when necessary to wake me. Still sleeping, I pet her and try to convince her to lay down and go back to sleep. A low growl eminates from the doorway. Cleo jumps down from the bed and searches out any bit of plastic that she can rustle. She rustles, and I grumble, tell her to stop, and roll over. Another growl from the doorway. Cleo increases her rustling - tackling the bag as though playing. I pick up the nearest empty water bottle (or chapstick or anything else non-breakable that won't injure) and throw it in the direction of the rustling. Cleo retreats to the doorway, where Holly hisses and boxes her ears. Cleo backs into the room submissively, and finds something even more annoying to make noise with. Exasperated, I get up and put her out of the room. As soon as the door is shut, the sounds of hissing and growling and a lot of boxing can be heard. A pitiful cry is heard and some more growling, fading into the distance as Holly stalks off into the living room. Then the scratching begins.

Once I put this all together, it hit me: Holly is the Don in this Kitty Mafia, and Cleo is her associate.